George walker bush (b. July 6, 1946) was the 43rd president of the United States, serving two terms between January 2001 and January 2009, with the first inauguration taking place on January 20, 2001. During his presidency, Bush would be both sharply criticized and highly praised for his stance on environmental issues and, over the years, would be seen to accept global warming verbally while politically denying it. Nevertheless, Bush would eventually come to support research into alternative energy means, if not for environmental preservation, for national security measures.
In his first year in office, Bush retreated from the Kyoto Protocol, which had been established as a way to limit emissions of greenhouse gases from global, economically-leading nations. Bush chose not to support the Kyoto Protocol despite that fact that the United States Senate had voted 95-0 in favor.
REJECTING THE PROTOCOL
Bush gave several reasons for choosing not to support the Protocol. First, that it would have been traumatically expensive for the nation’s economy to follow the Protocol, because only one fifth of the world’s population was to be held accountable for it. Second, he nations of China and India had not yet signed the Protocol. Third, Bush didn’t feel there was enough scientific evidence for human-caused global warming. In the year 2005, Department of State documents that were revealed that showed a strong influence of the ExxonMobil Corporation on domestic environmental policy. Additionally, the Exxon-led anti-Kyoto Protocol group Global Climate Coalition (GCC) was noted for influencing President Bush’s decision to reject the Kyoto Protocol.
The year after Bush retreated from the Kyoto Protocol, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA— an agency of the United States federal government) issued a Climate Action Report stating that recent decades’ global warming was, in fact, most likely due to human impact. Despite this report, Bush continued to doubt the science behind global warming and claimed that the EPA’s report was not to be trusted.
Next, in the year 2002, Bush attempted to weaken the Clean Air Act of 1963 (which was amended in 1967, 1970, 1977, and 1990) with his Clear Skies Act (eventually presented to, and rejected by, the Congress as the Clear Skies Act of 2003). The Clear Skies Act proposed to raise the caps on mercury, nitrogen oxide, and sulfur dioxide emissions by large amounts, to postpone pollution standard enforcement until the year 2015, and to permit companies to modernize using including non-compliant equipment.
Several people in high positions in the U.S. government have publicly denounced Bush’s repeated denial of global warming and his consistent dismissal of the scientific evidence. For example, James Hansen, the Director of the Goddard Institute at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), in the year 2004, accused Bush and his administration of hiding the dangers of greenhouse gases from public awareness. Joseph Romm, formerly an official at the Department of Energy, accused Bush and his administration of consistently denying and delaying steps that could reduce carbon dioxide emissions and global warming.
Another federal employee, Rick Piltz, of the U.S. Climate Change Science Program co-wrote climate reports. He, along with other employees, claimed that climate reports were repeatedly edited by Bush administration officials to lessen the appearance of a global warming threat. Piltz gave the example of a review draft that was returned from the White House with handwritten edits by Phil Cooney, chief of staff of the Council on Environmental Quality and former lobbyist for the American Petroleum Institute. In the report cited by Piltz, a statement about global warming being enhanced by energy production was crossed out by Cooney. In another section, the review draft warned of rapid changes in the Earth; Cooney changed this line to read "may be undergoing change". Piltz claims these examples are only two of the many unscientific, but political, changes that Cooney made to the review draft.
Despite Bush’s repeated denial of global warming and the need for political action, individuals in the United States recognized the value of the Kyoto Protocol and its suggestions and chose to follow the regulations, anyway. A 2005 article from BBC News of the United Kingdom, cited nine American states, 187 mayors (not necessarily only from those nine states), and several American-based international companies that signed up to heed Kyoto-based recommendations.
During his two terms in office, Bush eventually seemed to accept global warming as a fact and the necessity of public policy supporting alternative strategies. On August 8, 2005 Bush signed the Energy Policy Act of 2005, passed by Congress on July 29 of are unique to Hawaii. The area of land mass protected totals 139,000 sq. mi. (223,699 sq. km.).
Additionally, although the decision to do so was not related to global warming, but rather to national security and the relief from our dependence on foreign oil, Bush pledged in his 2007 State of the Union Address to reduce the consumption of fossil fuels and to expand research into alternative energy sources.
In preceding years, the Bush administration tried several times to open oil drilling in the 19-million acre Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) in Alaska, an area that ANWR supporters call the "last untouched wilderness" of the United States. There is a 2,000-acre plot where the proposed drilling would take place. Although the House of Representatives has repeatedly approved the bill, the Senate has repeatedly blocked its passage.
Under President Bush, the position of Secretary of Energy was held by Spencer Abraham (2001-05) and later by Samuel Bodman. Administrators for the EPA were Christine Todd Whitman (2001-03), Michael Leavitt (2003-05), and later, Stephen L. Johnson.
An oil pipeline in Alaska. The Bush administration sought to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling.
Despite his repeated attempts to weaken regulations for environmental protection, not all Bush’s actions were detrimental to the environment. For example, in 2006 Bush declared that the 84 million acres comprising the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands a national monument. This marine habitat holds 7,000 species of marine animals, including fish and birds. Out of these 7,000 species, greater than 1,500 species.
